Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a thermal management system for an electric or hybrid vehicle. The invention further relates to a method for air-conditioning the interior of a motor vehicle with such a thermal management system.
Description of the Background Art
Such a thermal management system is disclosed for example in WO 2011/029538 A1.
For electric or hybrid vehicles in general, the problem is that compared to conventional internal combustion engines, only little waste heat of the combustion or electric drive is available to be used for other purposes, in particular for heating the passenger compartment. Drawing on the electrical energy available for heating or cooling purposes regularly reduces the possible range in electric operation. Therefore, energy-efficient thermal management systems are desired for electric or hybrid vehicles in which energy-efficient heating or cooling of the passenger compartment is ensured.
To allow for the most effective heating of the passenger compartment, even at low outside temperatures, heat pumps are often used, based on a refrigerant circuit with an integrated compressor. By means of such heat pumps, generally heat from a heat reservoir, in particular from the surrounding area, is raised to a higher temperature level per the heat pump principle and supplied to the interior.
WO 2011/029538 A1 describes the use of waste heat from the electric powertrain in addition to the utilization of ambient heat. The waste heat is thereby fed to an evaporator of the refrigerant circuit of the heat pump.
DE 10 2010 043 576 A1 furthermore discloses a thermal management system in which in a conventional manner a heater core for heating the interior is integrated in a coolant circuit for cooling the engine. In addition, the waste heat of the electric powertrain can be introduced via an additional heat exchanger in the coolant circuit of the internal combustion engine.
DE 10 2008 020 366 A1 further discloses an interior air-conditioning system in which a conventional compressor air-conditioning unit with a refrigerant circuit is used as a primary cooling source. Moreover, a Peltier device is used as a secondary cooling source, which is integrated for example in a seat for seat cooling. In this case, it is provided to circulate air through the seat, which is cooled by the Peltier device.
DE 10 2010 021 901 A1 discloses a special design of such a Peltier device, in which several thermoelectric Peltier modules are traversed in a meandering fashion by a fluid.